BBG awarded by GWA, AHS

Posted on 2008-06-12 by admin

As both a supporter of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden (BBG), and a member of the Garden Writers Association (GWA), I’m proud to note that BBG received four GWA Media Awards earlier this year. Although GWA announced the awards back in April, the Brooklyn Eagle reported it today:

Brooklyn Botanic Garden (BBG) received four 2008 Silver Awards of Achievement from the Garden Writers Association (GWA) — the nonprofit association of professionals who communicate about horticulture, gardening, and the environment.

This national award recognizes individuals and companies who achieve the highest levels of talent and professionalism in garden publications. The awards aim to provide public recognition for excellence in gardening-related communications in all media.
– Brooklyn Botanic Garden Receives Awards From Garden Writers’ Group, Brooklyn Eagle, June 11, 2008

The four awards are:

Illustration: Book, to Sam Tomasello for Gardening with Children
Graphic Design: Cover, to Elizabeth Ennis for “Drawing From Life Exhibition Catalog” (Maud Purdy drew the beautiful illustration of ‘Heavenly Blue’ that graced the cover, back in 1932.)
Overall Product: Book, for Gardening with Children. Shared with Texas A&M University Press for Doug Welsh’s Texas Garden Almanac.
Overall Product: Electronic Media,
for “Big City, Big Trees”

In addition, the American Horticultural Society (AHS) awarded its first-ever Citation of Special Merit to BBG for the Garden’s All-Region Guide series. The Brooklyn Botanic Garden All-Region Guides are the only series of popular gardening books published by a botanic garden in North America.

Links

Brooklyn Botanic Garden Receives Awards From Garden Writers’ Group, Brooklyn Eagle, June 11, 2008
BBG Press Release, June 6, 2008
2008 GWA Media Awards
2008 AHS Book Award Winners

The Bluebell Wood at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Posted on 2008-05-19 by admin

The Bluebell Wood at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden as it appeared last Thursday, May 15th, 2008.

One of the things that great public gardens offer is large-scale displays of which gardeners of more modest means, and space, can only dream. The Bluebell Wood at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden is one such display:

More than 45,000 bluebells (Hyacinthoides hispanica ‘Excelsior’) are planted under a mature stand of oak, birch, and beech trees just south of Cherry Esplanade. In May, the bluebells burst into flower and create an enchanting woodland display.

I’d also like to know how much area they cover. It feels like an acre, but it’s probably “only” a quarter-acre. City gardeners don’t get much sense of garden space measured in acres. We’re usually dealing with space on the order of square feet.

These photos show how it looked last Thursday, when I also took the photos of the Osborne Garden. I don’t know how long this show lasts. I’ll be back there Wednesday evening for the start of my Pest Management class and see how it’s holding up.

The path in the photo above and immediately below leads to the meandering Cherry Walk and the two western entrances to the Japanese Garden.

This path leads from the formal fountain and roses – part of the Cranford Rose Garden – at the foot of the Cherry Esplanade.

Photos don’t do it justice. It’s hard to capture and adjust for the blue and light filtering through the trees. Morning or mid-day would probably be a better time for this than evening, when I visited.

Earlier in the Spring, it really doesn’t look like much at all.

Links

The Bluebell Wood, Brooklyn Botanic Garden

The Osborne Garden and Shade Garden at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Posted on 2008-05-17 by admin

Wisteria and Azaleas blooming in the Osborne Garden of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden

There are some stunning vistas to be had right now at the Osborne Garden of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. The Wisteria on the arbors and the azaleas bordering the central lawn are both in full bloom.

There’s also a sizable yet nearly hidden area of shade gardens. Right now, these are dominated by the flash of the Azaleas and Rhododendrons in bloom.

But the long shady borders have their own attractions, and provide lots of ideas for sun-challenged urban gardeners. Granted, this is “ideal” shade: a high canopy of shade provided by widely spaced trees with little competition from roots. Still, I’m getting some ideas for the shady border on the north side of my house.

I really like this Saruma, in the Ginger family. I saw one on the Brownstone Brooklyn Garden Walk last year. I never imagined drifts of it as I saw yesterday evening.

Saruma henryi

This is Chrysogonum virginianum “Pierre”. I’ve got the “Allen Bush” cultivar blooming in the native plant garden in my backyard right now.

Last night was the last session of my Botany class, the first of eight courses I need to complete to receive a Certificate in Horticulture from the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. I start Pest Management next week, and Woody Plant Identification after that. Expect more periodic, if irregular, updates of the garden as I get to witness and record its changes every week through the summer.

The Osborne Garden, April 6, 2008

Links

Osborne Garden, Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Next Week: Plant Feeding Frenzy at BBG

Posted on 2008-05-02 by admin

Next week is the annual Plant Sale at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, the largest on the East Coast. The Brooklyn Compost Project will also be on hand, selling compost bins and providing information about how to compost.

I’ve already bought waaaay too many plants this season, but I’m still planning to buddy up with a neighbor and be there for the Members-Only Preview portion of the sale. Part of the experience is just rubbing elbows with a couple hundred fellow plant-o-philes, ranging in knowledge and expertise from seedling to Ent. And I’ll pick up a few additions as well, I’m sure. I’m taking the week off to devote to gardening and catching up with my Spring cleanup chores.

Members-Only Preview Sale
Tuesday, May 6 | 4:30 p.m.–8 p.m.
Admission with BBG membership card only.

Open to the public
Wednesday, May 7 (9:00 a.m.–7:00 p.m.)
Thursday, May 8 (9:00 a.m.– Noon)

Admission to Garden & Plant Sale
Members: free
Adults: $8.00
Seniors (65 and over): $4.00
Students with ID: $4.00
Children under 12 accompanied by an adult: free

Note that, with each paid admission, visitors will receive a coupon for free-admission to use on a return visit to the Garden.

Special 50¢ Plants for Children
Conveniently located adjacent to the Children’s Garden. School classes may enter at 900 Washington Avenue or at the Flatbush Avenue gate. An ideal introduction to BBG’s Children’s Garden program. School groups are not permitted in main sale area. Admission is free for school classes.

FAQs

What do you sell?
Every kind of plant, both for indoors and outdoors: annuals, perennials, small trees and shrubs, roses, herbs, vegetables, all kinds of tomatoes (including many Heritage varieties), houseplants, orchids, hanging baskets…and more. Plants are the best quality at the best prices: unusually choice specimens, many rare varieties and native plants, handpicked and selected.

Will you have X (naming a specific plant)?
YES, we will have that or something very similar to it. Come to the sale, you’ll be sure to find what you want. There will be a huge selection, largest on the East Coast, better than a catalog because what you see is what you get.

Are all your plants grown at BBG?
All our plants are specially grown for the sale by selected growers, most of them local. [Short answer: No.]

Will there be lots to choose from on Wednesday and Thursday?
YES! There will be thousands of first-rate plants. There will also be free special events throughout both days of the sale—lectures and demonstrations (details above).

How can I get my plants home?
There will be a free checkroom where you can leave plants overnight and pick them up the next day.

Can I bring my own cart?
Yes, please do. [Done!]

Tell me about the Member-Only Plant Sale Preview.
Only members will be allowed in. You can join the Garden on the spot (annual membership starts at $40) to attend the Plant Sale Preview.

Sakura Matsuri this weekend

Posted on 2008-05-01 by admin

This weekend is Sakura Matsuri, the Cherry Blossom Festival, at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. The weather cooled down just in time. The cherries are still holding at peak in my neighborhood, but there are drifts of petals swirling around. With rain predicted tonight and through the weekend, we may just get a soggy mess. We’ll see if BBG’s main display holds up for the weekend. I’ll be checking in on them before Botany class this evening, weather permitting.

The purpose of the mysterious camera at the end of the Cherry Walk has been confirmed. BBG released a timelapse video composed of over 3,000 photographs taken with the camera.

2008 Cherry Blossom Timelapse at Brooklyn Botanic Garden from Brooklyn Botanic Garden on Vimeo.

This timelapse was created by Dave Allen, BBG’s Web Manager, from over 3,000 digital photos, one taken every 3 minutes from April 18 to April 26, 2008, of Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s famed Cherry Walk.

The original music is by Jon Solo, a Brooklyn-based musician and producer.

Hanami

Links

See the 2008 Cherry Blossom Timelapse at Brooklyn Botanic Garden in HD on vimeo
Music by Jon Solo, a Brooklyn-based musician and producer.

More Hanami at BBG

Posted on 2008-04-25 by admin

Cherry Esplanade, Brooklyn Botanic Garden

On my way to Botany class at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden last night, I checked out the Cherry Esplanade. This is the big show, folks. Most of the cherries at BBG are now in full bloom.

The forecast calls for rain most of the weekend. Not the best for viewing, but it will keep the crowds down.

The Cherry Esplanade viewed from The Overlook.

Hanami at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, April 4, 2008
Introducing the BBG Hanami Flickr Group, April 3, 2008

Links

Flowering Cherries at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Native Flora Garden, BBG, April 2008

Posted on 2008-04-18 by admin

Sanguinaria canadensis, Bloodroot, Native Flora Garden, BBG

Set aside the Cherries for a moment. Now is the time to visit the Native Flora Garden at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden.

There’s always something to see in this garden at any time of year – it’s a great spot for birdwatching, for example – but right now, during this brief week or two, is when most of the spring ephemerals are in their peak bloom. Check it out soon, or you’ll have to wait another year for this show to repeat itself.

With more than two acres divided into eight geographical zones, this wildflower garden exhibits native plants growing in the New York Metropolitan Area, a region known for its natural diversity.

Dating back to 1911, the Native Flora Garden isn’t just another wildflower display. In 1931, this wild retreat was ecologically designed to support nine distinct plant communities found within a 100-mile radius of New York City: serpentine rock, dry meadow, kettle pond, bog, pine barrens, wet meadow and stream, deciduous woodland, and limestone ledge, as well as a border mound with several representatives of the region’s coniferous forests.

All plants in this garden are appropriate for their particular ecological niches, determined by environmental factors such as topography, geology, soil acidity or alkalinity, moisture, drainage, and light.

I took this set of photos last night on my way to Botany class. This is not even everything that’s blooming right now, just the ones I had time to shoot before I had to head off to class.

Caltha palustris, Marsh Marigold

Dicentra eximia, Bleeding-Heart

Erythronium americanum, Trout-Lily

Dicentra cucullaria, Dutchman’s Breeches

Uvularia sessilifolia, Wild Oats

I am also quite fond of ferns.

Osmunda cinnamonea, Cinnamon Fern, with some Skunk Cabbage behind

Osmunda regalis, Royal Fern

Links

Native Flora Garden, Brooklyn Botanic Garden
Brooklyn Native, New York City Garden, is a great writeup of tips and sources if, like me, you’re interested in growing native plants in your own Brooklyn or NYC garden.
Native Plants Database, Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center

A Weekend at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Part 3: The Rock Garden

Posted on 2008-04-08 by admin

The Rock Garden, viewed from just inside the southernmost entrance.

A year ago I “discovered” the Rock Garden at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden:

I did get to see the Rock Garden as I had planned. I wasn’t disappointed. I don’t usually get to see this garden. It just seems off the beaten path during my usual visits. I want to visit it more often.
– A Visit to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, April 1, 2007

The Rock Garden lies between the main western path of the garden and Flatbush Avenue. I’ve been able to visit the Rock Garden each month so far this year. Spring seems to be a peak time of year for this garden.

This boulder-strewn slope provides some of the earliest signs of spring as well as brilliant color in the fall. Opened to the public in 1917, it was the first rock garden of considerable size in an American botanic garden.

BBG’s Rock Garden uses boulders to define beds and create pockets of microclimates where plants with a variety of special needs are able to thrive. Many of the plants showcased are compact and suited to growing in small spaces.

Many of the boulders that pepper the landscape were unearthed during construction of various parts of BBG, and were deposited on the site during the last ice age.

During a renovation in 1992, additional boulders, imported from Westchester County, were added to the original collection, pathways were widened, and steps were eliminated wherever possible. Today the Rock Garden is about two-thirds wheelchair and stroller accessible …

The heaths were buzzing with bees when I visited on Saturday.

Erica carnea ‘Springwood Pink’

Heaths and Spring Bulbs

Right now, the Rock Garden is also a great place to see a wide variety of Daffodils and other Spring bulbs in bloom.

Narcissus in the Rock Garden

Narcissus ‘Prologue’

Narcissus ‘Wee Bee’

The Hellebores were also happy.

Helleborus orientalis, Lenten-Rose

And just keep looking around. There’s something new and different everywhere you look.

Corydalis

Corylopsis pauciflora, Buttercup Winterhazel

Rhododendron P.J.M.

I also swung by the Rock Garden when I attended Making Brooklyn Bloom on Saturday, March 8. During breaks in the rains, it was lovely.

Crocuses in the Rock Garden

Crocuses and Snowdrops

Crocus tommasinianus

Pair a Ducks

Part 1: The Osborne Garden
Part 2: Magnolia Plaza
First Crocus, Rock Garden, BBG, February 16, 2008
Brooklyn Botanic Garden, January 21, 2008
Brooklyn Botanic Garden, April 14 and April 1, 2007
My Flickr photo sets of BBG’s Rock Garden

Links

Rock Garden, Brooklyn Botanic Garden

A weekend at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Part 2: Magnolia Plaza

Posted on 2008-04-07 by admin

Judith D. Zuk Magnolia Plaza, Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Check out the photo above, and select the largest size your bandwidth and screen size can handle. Place yourself in that picture, take a deep breath, and imagine the fragrance that saturated the air: a mix of citrus and spice, light, not heavy or thick, that clears the sinuses and the mind.

The Magnolia Plaza doesn’t get much better than it was when I saw it this past Saturday. A textbook sky, a warm, Spring day, the majority of the species and varieties of Magnolias in the plaza just coming into peak, with barely a dropped petal to be seen anywhere.

From BBG’s Web site:

From March-blooming star magnolias (Magnolia stellata) to saucer magnolias (M. x soulangiana) in April, Magnolia Plaza is sweetly scented with 17 varieties.

Magnolia stellata, Star Magnolia

Magnolia kobus

Magnolia, unrecorded variety

Magnolia Plaza is an elegant formal garden of magnificent trees spread in front of the beaux arts Administration Building. The sweet scent and showy blossoms of magnolias are among the early signs of spring at Brooklyn Botanic Garden. In March, the star magnolias (Magnolia stellata) bloom, covering the trees with millions of lacy white flowers. In April the Plaza is splashed with the ivory, yellow, pink, and rich purple of 17 varieties of magnolias. The last of the collection, the sweet-bay magnolia (M. virginiana), reveals its fragrant, creamy white flowers in June.

Magnolia Plaza, with the landmark BBG Lab & Admin Building

More of Magnolia Plaza

Part 1: The Osborne Garden
Magnolia Plaza, BBG, April 2008 (Flickr photo set)

Links

Judith D. Zuk Magnolia Plaza, Brooklyn Botanic Garden

A weekend at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Part 1: The Osborne Garden

Posted on 2008-04-06 by admin

The Osborne Garden, Brooklyn Botanic Garden

I spent most of yesterday and a couple of hours today at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. There were several things that drew me to the gardens this weekend:

Yesterday morning I attended a meeting of the newly forming Brooklyn Community Gardens Coalition.
After that, I met up with OldRoses of A Gardening Year and her Straw Hatters on a field trip to BBG from New Jersey.
Today I went for Forsythia Day to pick up my Forsythia and Signature Plants.

I took hundreds of photos from every part of the gardens except the greenhouses. I’ve gotten most of them through my workflow, but there’s still more to sort through, cull, edit, label and so on. It will take me a few days, so I thought I would take the opportunity to organize a series of posts, grouped by the area of the garden, regardless of which day I took the photos.

I’m cheating a little with this first group; I took many of them Thursday evening, on my way to my Botany class. These are all from the Osborne Garden, the formal gardens that bridge the Eastern Parkway entrance to BBG with the main body of the garden. In past years, I’ve hardly ever seen this garden. It’s out of the way; unless you enter or exit from Eastern Parkway, between Mount Prospect Park and the Brooklyn Museum, it’s a detour, a cul-de-sac off the beaten path. But since the the Eastern Parkway stop on the 2/3 train is right there, this will be my commute to evening classes at BBG. I’ll be seeing, and photographing, a lot more of the Osborne Garden over the next year or two.

Here’s how BBG describes the Osborne Garden on their Web site:

This three-acre, Italian-style formal garden is a kaleidoscope of color in May with azaleas, rhododendrons, crabapples, and wisteria draped over wood and stone pergolas.

The art of formal Italian landscaping comes to life in the Osborne Garden, where wisteria-draped pergolas frame an emerald lawn. In spring, daffodils, pansies, and tulips bloom, followed by crab apples and cherries, which gradually give way to azaleas, rhododendrons, and wisterias. The 30,000-square-foot central green is surrounded by a fountain, water basin, stone seats, and soaring columns.

My botany class runs into May. I’m hoping that gives me a chance to see the Wisteria in bloom on the pergolas.

Wisteria Pergolas, Osborne Garden

Wisteria Pergola

Grappling Wisteria

On the east and west sides of the central lawn are walkways through 10 pergolas draped with wisteria. Evergreens and flowering fruit trees such as cherries and crab apples shade the walkways. Rhododendrons and azaleas line the paths, and on the west side is a boulder wall accented with shrubs, perennials, and annuals.

Birch, Daffodils and Forsythia

Pansies overlooking the Osborne Garden

I caught up with the Straw hatters about halfway through their visit. They had just finished visiting the Children’s Garden, and were coming up the Flatbush Avenue side of the garden to the Rock garden, where I met them. We looped around from there, including a pass through the Osborne Garden.

Straw Hatters in the Osborne Garden

They were admiring one of the Cornus mas, Cornelian Cherries, in bloom.

There’s lots of yellow happening right now.

The southwestern spur of the Osborne Garden has azaleas and rhododendrons. These will be also be something to watch over the coming weeks.

Gable Rhododendron ‘Conewago Imperial’

Rhododendron mucronulatum var. ciliatum

Part 2: Magnolia Plaza
Botany for Horticulturists, April 3, 2008

Links

Osborne Garden, Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Flatbush Gardener

Urban Habitat Gardening with Native Plants

Tag Archives: Brooklyn Botanic Garden

BBG awarded by GWA, AHS

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The Bluebell Wood at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden

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The Osborne Garden and Shade Garden at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden

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A Weekend at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Part 3: The Rock Garden

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